The holiday season is a time filled with deep emotion. Our physical reality is calling us to place our attention outward, externally. It is encouraging us to consume, to buy toys, gifts and present. To have enough money to give our loved ones a “good holiday”. I often ask “Where is the space for feeling my grief, my melancholy, and my longing” during this time. Most of us have all lost someone near and dear to us, we all will share this experience in time. There needs to be space to feel all of our emotions. To put down this mask that we’ve picked up to try and conceal our pain, hurt and longing. How do we integrate and embody our truth without feeling completely incapacitated? Without feeling the pressure to go against ourselves and put on a “happy face” for the sake of the holiday season and not wanting to make others feel uncomfortable. Let’s explore this together.
Art by myself, @visualheartmedicine via instagram
Losing Loved ones is inevitable
I’ve lost a lot this past year, a family friend, and my father. I have grieved so much this year not only through physical death but through the death of a experience, a friendship, a job and the list continues. This has affected the way I show up for others and my capacity to feel with them. My loved ones are always in my heart, never far. I catch myself wondering why they left when they did, and how they did. Questioning why Creator would have taken them from me at such a ripe and tender age. The thing is Life is not punishing you. Life is indifferent to who you are, the life you’ve lived and experiences you’ve accumulated. Things happen, death happens. Feeling emotions of grief, sadness, longing, desperation anger, and abandonment are all part of the process. Grief is such a profound gift because it means you have loved deeply. So deeply that you have now lost deeply. The wound is part of the gift. Don’t try to deny it or push it away. But how do we go on? How does life continue to move forward when mine has stopped completely?
The effect grief and longing has on the physical body
When we are suppressing our true emotions we are denying their existence. It is as if we are gaslighting ourselves, telling ourselves that our emotions are invalid, that what we experienced wasn’t impactful, and that it’s meaningless. Suppressing our truth and our emotions is one of the most unloving things we can do to ourselves. It is a form of self abandonment. This causes us to lose touch with our physical body and to live in the mind. What the mind suppresses the body expresses. We stop feeling, we dissociate from our bodies and become a living shell of a being. Our words loose luster and vitality and our bodies close and shut down. Grief and Longing specifically most often affect our upper extremities living most often in our chest, neck, shoulders and upper back. These suppressed emotions compile and condense into matter, when they were once etheric energy in motion. When we stop feeling them we become trapped and isolated in time, living in the past. This leads to chronic pain, and the retelling of old stories and narratives that caused us to become stuck. So how do we move through it?
How to be with all of your emotions and not loose yourself
Know that you are not alone in your grief. You are never alone in your grief. Every heart on this hearth has been and will be touched by grief. It is what makes us Human. It is what makes us alive. Grief, longing and melancholy are all rational, acceptable human emotions. I find that there is comfort in remembering our innate connection with all of life. Knowing that we all feel grief even those of us who try to suppress it. Especially those who try to suppress it. If you are in the stage of denying yourself and invalidating your emotions know that there is no pressure to speed up the healing process, but do be aware and mindful that it is only going to prolong your experience of sitting with and integrating your pain. I invite you to carve out some time even 5 minutes a day to sit with all of you. All of your mess, all of your feelings of unworthiness, pity, inadequacy and grief. I invite you to feel all of it in your body as a physical sensation. Where do you notice these sensations? Ask yourself. Allow yourself to unfold, unravel and allow it to be as messy as it wants. Your body is wise. Do not try to psychoanalyze this process. Once you’ve had enough time to feel try turning towards a safe outlet. I like to journal and reflect on the experience. Everything that requires your time, all of your responsibilities will still be there I promise. You can give yourself 5 minutes of full presence.
Gentle offering for Connection
If you feel open enough you are very welcome to share in your process of your grieving journey in the comment section of this post. It is my intention to create a safe, loving and intentional container to hold all of us. There is no obligation and no resentment held if you don’t feel ready. This is a love offering from my heart to yours.
Song: Feel Jahnavi Harrison
Conclusion
We all grieve. We all feel deeply. To have loved is such a gift. Don’t pressure yourself to be okay during this holiday season or ever for that matter. Be confident in yourself and your process. Allow your body to express freely and be brave enough to feel deeply, to confront your emotions and to not hide from them and store them in your body. Be kind and gentle with yourself.
Infinite Love,
Star
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